Digital Distribution of Video Games

Platforms like Steam and Xbox Marketplace have changed the way games are delivered and consumed by gamers. These have made it easier for consumers to play games without the exchange or purchase of new physical media. The first example of the digital distribution of video games was seen in 1981 with Gameline, a service which allowed Atari 2600 owners to use a specialized cartridge to connect through a phone line to a central server and rent a video game for 5–10 days. Also, computers of the 80s were capable of saving and loading games to/from cassette tapes in a tape recorder. This basically worked by interpreting the audio data as game data. This prompted some pirate FM radio stations in the 1980s to broadcast games right over FM radio every weekend.